Topics

Thursday, March 17, 2011

TotalFinder brings tabs to your native Finder and more!

When i switched to Mac a few years ago one thing i missed most was dual pane file manage, like TotalCommander (or for the oldies here NortonCommander).

After testing a lot of Finder replacements like MuCommander or PathFinder i finally found TotalFinder which adds all what i want directly to the Finder.

It's not free but the price is moderate for the functions you get, read a overview of a few selected features:

Tabbed Browsing
Add tabs on top of Finder. The same tabs as seen in Google Chrome.
You already know tabs from your web browser. For example, in Safari the tabs are sheets for displaying multiple web pages within one browser window.

Similarly, in TotalFinder tabs display multiple directories within one window. TotalFinder uses the code from Google's Chrome web browser, which is why the tabs look and behave in a similar way.

Dual ModeDisplay two Finder windows side-by-side in dual mode.
Dual mode is a special mode where TotalFinder displays two Finder windows side-by-side. It is a similar view to what can be seen in classic dual-panel file managers. This is handy in situations when you want to move files from one panel to the other easily.

Please note that individual Finder windows still behave the same as if they were individual windows. For example both windows keep their own toolbar. The only difference is that TotalFinder places the sidebar of the right-side window to the right edge and syncs its width with the left sidebar.

You may enter dual mode by double-clicking a tab or pressing ⌘U. The selected tab will join with the tab next to it and form dual tabs with two file browsers side-by-side. To leave dual mode double-click the dual tab again. The advantage of this setup is that you can create multiple dual tabs and manipulate them the same way as single tabs.

Folders on Top
Don't make me think. Folders should always go first in list view.
By default Finder does not separate folders and files and displays them mixed as you can see on the left.

However, some users prefer to see first folders and then files regardless of actual sorting options.
TotalFinder enables toggle of this display by a keyboard shortcut.

Show System Files
Show me all files on the disk. I'm not afraid to see the cruft.

If you, like me, prefer keyboard shortcuts you will find a lot of options to do so in TotalFinder. Fully customizable keyboard shortcuts are also available.

Asepsis

When you view a folder using Finder you can tweak its display options like icon size, sorting options or color labels. These settings are sticky and will apply anytime you return to view the folder. Finder remembers these settings in a hidden file named .DS_Store which is saved into the given folder. You might have noticed those files when working with some software which is not aware of this convention. For example some UNIX command-line tools or seeing your Mac disks from a Windows machine.

And here is the problem: those files are being created whenever you open folder in Finder even if you don't tweak anything. They get created on every visit and pollute disks with those tiny files. Normally you would not see those files in Finder, but if you use a command-line tool or enable display of those files in Finder you can get annoyed quickly.

Asepsis enables you to redirect creation of those files into a special, dedicated folder. With redirection, Finder works the same way but .DS_Store files are isolated in the dedicated folder /usr/local/.dscache.

And last but not least an exclusive preview of TotalFinder for Lion.

A single user license costs 15$ and i promise you its totally worth it!

There is also a 14 day free trial available so why not check it out and fall in love with TotalFinder like i did?

I have to agree with Erika, a lot of that should be built into the OS. Having to use a third party app for decent file management is a step back from being able to sit at any computer (not just your own) and work effectively.